Justice challenge

Disease offers courts no defence

LIKE THE rest of the country, the courts are having to find new ways of working. Yet, while it is also an opportunity to see how new technology can make proceedings more timeeffective, Richard Wright, the region’s leading QC, makes a number of valid points.

Explaining how the coronavirus, and deferral to new cases, means defendants pleading not guilty will now have to wait up to a year for a jury trial, he says the Ministry of Justice is going to have to recognise the consequences of this. That means making sure that crown courts are in a position to reopen as soon as possible – and extending sittings if practical.

Yet, while public sympathy for the accused will be in short supply, undue delays add to the heavy burden being carried by witnesses who are being required to give evidence – the passage of time can, understandably, blur the memory. But two other points also need to be made. While video-links could spare barristers travelling long distances to attend the cases, defendants must remain compelled to be present in court to enter pleas and for the more formal elements of proceedings – to take part from their living rooms would risk trivialising the justice system.

And, finally, it is imperative that proceedings are carried out in public and further steps taken to assist the media with this duty – open justice matters to victims and all those who want the reassurance that crimes committed in their neighbourhoods are still being treated with utmost seriousness by the courts. Coronavirus offers no defence for any compromise of these tenets.